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Thursday, May 31, 2007

I finally had time to make it to the new doughnut place at the Curve. Ever since they announced their opening in the papers last weekend which I totally missed, it's been packed with people that there has already been a few blog reviews. It's located behind TGIF next to the yet to open The Apartment.

According to the people who work at this place, they say the doughnuts are based on a recipe from New York. Not too sure about it since there's no mention about a Big Apple Donut franchise if I google. It looks like this could be a similar doughnut set up to the ones who are now cashing in on the Krispy Kreme fame. Guess it's a good idea to bring this in and start a trend to reap the monies before the actual Krispy Kreme arrive on our shores. Kinda reminds me of the same business model the two doughnut places in Singapore are doing at Raffles Shopping Centre and at Vivocity where people queue up for their doughnuts.

Currently the opening promotion is buy twelve doughnuts at RM17 and get half a dozen doughnuts for free. Note that for the twelve doughnuts, you can choose the various types but for the free doughnuts they only give you Glacier doughnuts which is simply glazed. If you order a drink (not mineral water) as they also serve various coffee and teas, you can also get a free Glacier doughnut.

Signages are quite sparse when it comes to the types of doughnuts they offer and when I was there, not all the glass trays at the display counter were filled up. From a piece of paper stuck at the wall of their open plan kitchen, I counted a total of seventeen varieties but I've only managed to identify sixteen varieties. The kitchen is open plan and pretty small with emphasis on the doughnut glazing machine while toppings is added by hand. This first one is called California Almond - topped with icing and flake almonds. Not bad and not too sweet.

This one is called Cool Blue as it has blueberry jam in the middle while the sides are dipped in a glaze.

This is the Banana Rama - glazed with dark chocolate on the side and in the middle a dollop of strongly flavoured banana cream.

This is the Walnut - dark chocolate glazed with chopped walnuts on top of it.

This one is the Witnut which comes with a peanut butter filling and a white chocolate topping.

This is similar to the Ice Blue except this is called Hot Berry and comes with a strawberry filling.

This is their Snowy doughnut which is just a plain doughnut topped with icing sugar.

This is the Choreo - topped with powdered oreo cookies.

This is the Cocoring which is topped with Belgian dark chocolate.

This one is known as the Green Teaser whereby the topping is green tea. The flavour is quite subtle that it's not easy to figure out the taste of the green tea.

This one is the Mango Tango - topped with mango cream and glazed.

This has a cute name - Moonraker where it's milk chocolate glazed and sprinkled with Coco Pops which they claim is James Bond favourite.

Aside from these ones, there's the Glacier, Semi-Glacier which is less sweet, Iceberg (has vanilla and cream) and Simply Cheese which I know of. The doughnuts tend to be not very sweet and quite soft. Some reckon Dunkin Donuts is better as it's bigger and has more bite to it. Note that Dunkin Donuts and Big Apple Donut is selling each doughnut for RM2 but one dozen doughnuts is RM18 at Dunkin Donuts and slightly cheaper in Big Apple at RM17 but smaller. Half a dozen doughnuts at Big Apple is RM9.50 but RM10 at Dunkin Donuts. The boxes are pretty nifty - huge flat one for the one dozen doughnuts with detailed instructions to keep it refrigerated and to warm it up for 8 seconds in the microwave.

Per an annoymous comment left on Eat First Think Later's blog, the concept for Big Apple is exactly like an Indonesian chain of doughnut company called J.Co Donuts and Coffee. Strange but their website is down but this blog, A Guide to Organized Chaos by Aidil & Shaz has pictures of the J.Co doughnuts they sampled. Check the similarity of the design of the doughnuts right down to the glass trays and labels used at the shop which is the same as Big Apple Donuts.

*Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here is entirely based on my personal tastebuds and may vary for others. The reviewer also declares that she has not received any monetary or non-monetary compensation from the restaurant for writing this review.

47 comments:

I love Krispy Kreme!!!! I used to travelled to Los Angelas every year for business and I will sure eat a dozen and bring back a dozen. I still miss the Krispy Kreme doughnut very much....there are now in Hong Kong but I am not sure when there will be in SEA!!!

Krispy Kremes! YUM! The queues are never short when I had them in Australia (weird that different outlets offer different, prices both in Syndey & Melbourne). Checked out their franchising info and I think I know why we don't see those in Malaysia.. I think you'd need more than just several years to see your return of investment. LOL.

Saw this Big Apple promo in the papers a few weeks ago (them giving out free donuts) but totally forgot about it till now. Will check it out for sure! :)

wow..i think this is the first time you had that many pictures!..and a very detailed summary too! full ons review..yeah i luv krispy kremes..those aussie days..i heard you can actually setup a franchise but just that it involves alot of moolah..any rich takers out there? you definitely have the demand here!

I guess everyone's nuts abt Krispy Kremes. We always make it a point to get some whenever we go to the US. In the meantime, we'll just have to look for other options here. U've done a great writeup on Big Apple Donuts...it'll help me decide when I want to get a few. :-)

oooohh...donuts!!! heavenly yet unforgiving on the hips...but yes krispy kremes are too die for. had them in london and aussie. will definitely check out Big Apple's donuts when i'm in KL and see how they rate against krispy kremes.Meanwhile, can some rich kind soul bring the franchise over to malaysia???

Hi, great review and thanks for linking me in. Tastelike, I think that Dunkin Donuts are better, seriously. Sadly, I haven't had the time to eat Donuts from Krispy. Clearly, copying business models is normal, but the main point is: What is the differentiator in the business vis-a-vis the competition. Is it the culture, a better delivery or anything else.

Yeah, i went to Indonesia sometimes ago and went to JCO. To my suprise everything that bigapple have is similar with JCO. the logo, the donuts (even the topping), the crew uniform, the donut packaging.to satisfy my curiosity, i ask the JCO crew over there asked whether big apple & Jco donuts owner is the same person... and to my surprise they said "NO"...hmmm then big apple must have really rip JCO off... or the other way around??. but then i asked them (JCO) again how long has been in Indonesia? they said 2 years already... hmm... so we know who the pirate here... arrgh ya matey.

ok i'm still not over the donut craze...have been dreaming of Krispy Kreme donuts since i read this entry...so today i googled KK in asia and to my surprise found that KK is IN asia! They're already in Japan, Hong Kong, Korea, Phillipines and Indonesia!! So...hopefully its only a matter of time before they come here!!

I wonder if it ethical to totally emulate one's own product. We see resemblance everywhere in here, the logo's (see the font there, and the picture concept), the uniform, the store layout, and mostly the product...

We know well that J.co is emulating KK, but it goes only as far as the kitchen concept (open kitchen). So let us ask once more....is it ethical in any way....?

hi... juz some stories from friend of mine. j.co donuts and big apples' owners were partners in indonesia, where big apples' malaysian n j.co's indonesian... somehow rather the j.v did not work out n big apples' owner cameback home and opened big apples...

i can make sense of the story coz if i were the real intellectual properties' owner, i should have sued big apples for the copycat.. i have yet to see j.co taking any actions...

I'm dying for the official 'story of Big Apple Donuts', but their website is not up yet. I would have ensured my website was up BEFORE I started the business as look at all the hype bloggers have created, would have been flooded with back-links.

That said, there's a well decent guide over at sabahbah.com - in Kota Kinabalu we have 22 donuts on the menu, and one or two that appeared new recently.

I agree with those Krispy Kreme lovers as I am one of the big fans of KK as well. Just loved the Original Glazed...Anyway, whenever i head to Birmingham, KK will definitely be in one of my must-have shopping list. Harrods in London too has KK outlet...oh KK...I LOVE U!!!! :)

Sure. Nice things said about Big Apples!!, but do you know where their staffs live? Checkout No.11 Jalan PJU 7/8B Mutiara Damansara (Mutiara Homes), there are DIRTY..the residents are not happy with this...these people have been throwing rubbish in front of their house *renting house*..all of them live in the same house!!!.

We have been calling their Managers since yesterday..FYI,they been staying there more than a year.....

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